I hate assemblies. I can't stand the contrived, rehearsed, robotic sound of the interviews and experiences. I can't stand the repeated references to the FDS, and I especially can't stand the college education bashing that seems to be thrown in there in just about every other talk.
Here's my assesment of the assembly:
- The visiting speaker from Bethel who spoke a nearly incomprehensible dialect of Spanish, kept dissecting scriptures and running away with ridiculous applications. He broke them down into individual components, explaining essentially the basic elements of similies or metaphores for the braindead, uneducated masses that populated the assembly hall. "This is the literal reference, this is the imaginitive one..blah blah blah". He would then take a clearly symbolic or poetic verse from Psalms or Isaiah and proceed to extract not just one, not just two, but THREE applications from the text. He continually asserted that each one of these scriptures actually had THREE fulfillments. The first was the "typical" fullfillment, and the second was --- the present day fulfillment - ie. - the spiritual paradise that we all enjoy. That point was harped on ad nauseum - the idea that we are ALREADY IN PARADISE. I think the leadership is beginning to worry about the length of this system of things going on as far as the eye can see, and they are sensing a growing weariness or dissatisfaction among the rank and file..so rather than merely resorting to the old tried and true method of dangling the carrot stick of "paradise earth and living forever soon to come", they are now insidiously introducting the idea that we are already in paradise...much like the Catholic Church began to claim that the Kingdom of the Heavens had already arrived and was represented by membership in the universal church.
- Both in the watchtower study and in later parts, reporting sins to the elders was harped on again and again. "We have to protect our spiritual paradise" was said repeatedly. Ratting out non-conformists and dissenters was reinforced as a virtue inecessantly. It made feel as if I was in an Orwellian universe.
- University education was demeaned on multiple occassions. They demonized the idea, listing it among one of "Satan's false refuges" - in other words...University Education comes from Satan as the source. There was a talk entitled in Spanish, "Young People, Do You Put Your Trust in Jehovah?" --- That's JW parlance for "Young People, Don't go to College or Pursue a Career". Why do they hide behind these equivocal weasel ways of phrasing their messages?
I left the assembly hall mentally drained and frustrated..It was a tiresome experience to say the least...
